In this WrestleTalk News, are WrestleMania plans in danger, Triple H is really still
in control of creative, promise, and Luke’s review of Raw.
For all of WWE’s faults over the years, January is usually a time for a bit of optimism
and excitement among fans.
Sadly however, the fast-emergent black cloud of Vince McMahon’s return has truly sucked
a lot of that good feeling right out of everyone’s sails leading up to the event on January 28th.
It’s just a little Vince McMahon, it’s still good, it’s still good.
Vince’s return has now also raised question marks regarding a number of creative plans
leading into WrestleMania 39 in Hollywood.
Among these is of course The Rock’s much rumored familial showdown with Roman Reigns.
While The Rock’s Mania status has always been a bit up in the air, the question is
whether the recent controversy surrounding Vince and in particular the Saudi led purchase
of the company be set to derail it altogether?
According to Dave Meltzer on the latest Wrestling Observer Radio, the return of Vince to the
company will have “no impact whatsoever” on The Rock showing up at Mania, despite all
the allegations and investigations into his conduct.
However, Meltzer says a potential sale to Saudi Arabia is a “different story”, suggesting
that if the Saudi deal was to happen it could potentially affect WWE and Johnson’s working
relationship.
Although Meltzer again says that it is unlikely to affect Mania plans directly given that
the sale is unlikely to happen prior to April’s two-night event.
But crazier things have happened.
According to Meltzer, The Rock’s appearance at Mania is also in question due to him having
to promote the XFL during Mania season, however it is possible he could do both depending
on whether he’s got time to train and get in ring-shape in the meantime.
Importantly Dwayne is still the bookmakers joint-second favorite to win the Rumble match
along with Sami Zayn, only behind the returning Cody Rhodes, so it certainly can’t be ruled
out whatsoever.
Sticking with the internal power struggle within WWE, and according to Fightful, Triple
H held yet another talent-meeting prior to last night’s episode of Raw.
The meeting reportedly seemed to echo the sentiments of the last one Trips held prior
to Smackdown, with him once again reiterating to talent that he is “firmly” still leading
creative for the company.
Which I’m sure will completely ease everyone’s minds after Stephanie McMahon told everyone
it’s all fine, don’t panic, and then resigned.
And with more and more reports emerging that Vince McMahon is back and making suggestions
behind the scenes already, with Fightful noting he’s been telling certain WWE departments
they were “doing things wrong”.
Dave Meltzer noted on Wrestling Observer Radio that there’s a “feeling” backstage that
Vince will want to be back on TV before long to get that “big reaction”, and confirmed
that he’d returned to his office and was talking about things “other than the sale”.
He went on to say a lot of WWE talent are now nervous due to Vince having a very different
creative outlook to Triple H.
“He [Vince] has a very different eye and mind for talent than Paul [Levesque], and
there’s a lot of guys there that Paul sees something in that Vince won’t.”
We’ve seen a ton of returns since Triple H took over creative, specifically of those
people that Trips sees something in that Vince seemingly didn’t, so I’m sure they’re
just having a great time right now.
Now hot tag to Luke.
And now it’s time for my review of Monday Night Raw - aka the although next week’s
show is the one to watch so this one is filler doesn’t mean it has to feel like a filler
episode of Monday Night Raw… in about 5 minutes.
The show opened with The Bloodline - minus Sami Zayn so minus five stars once again - who
promoted their match for next week when they defend the Raw Tag Team Championships, and
only the Raw titles - a point I missed last week - against The Judgement Day at Raw XXX.
They also said that every member of The Bloodline will be on the show next week, which seems
to be a massive tease that The Rock is going to be at Raw XXX… or it will be Toni Storm.
Judgement Day came out to put over Ex-Con Dom, but the real highlight was Rhea Ripley
getting in the face of Solo Sikoa in a legit dream match.
Sadly Mustafa Ali jumped on Sikoa to ruin all of our wet dreams, and then got beaten
resoundley by Solo after the Samoan Spike.
There was a brief moment when Ali was on top - following Kevin Owens brawling with The
Usos at ringside - and security broke up the brawl after the match.
There was a Petey Williams spotting here, which makes up for the lack of Sami Zayn when
you really think about it.
There was a promo for Raw XXX that played a few times in the show, which was very cool
as it showed all of the moments from Raw’s 30 year history you’d expect to see, but
I was so massively distracted because it was soundtracked by a song that sampled a track
from the 90s by Eiffel 65.
The song in question is called ‘Blue”.
Blue is the colour of the other show!
I was so distracted by this I nearly missed the announcement that Cody Rhodes announced
he’s going to be in the Royal Rumble!
These videos have been so great, and it is crazy impressive how Cody has gone from purple
tits to a Rumble return in just seven months.
Street Profits beat Cedric Alexander and Shelton Benjamin despite interference from MVP, who
then argued with him after the match.
I think the finish of this match was slightly blown as MVP interfered right in front of
the ref and the commentators had to cover for it, but it tells a nice story of MVP trying
to put the band back together even if not everyone is on the same page yet.
This will also play into the main event.
And why not make us your main event by subscribing to this channel, and hitting that bell for
notifications.
Becky Lynch called out Bayley for an excellent promo segment that got off to a rocky start
as they just talked over each other about what a Karen is.
But when they got into the meat of the promo - which talked about their shared history
of NXT, and how Bayley feels that Becky stole her spot on the main roster and left her in
developmental, while Becky argues that Bayley needed to stay there as that locker room needed
a leader - which is all a true story by the way - this all got really great.
Both women killed it on the mic, and it set up a cage match for next week, which Becky
goaded Bayley into accepting.
Brilliant stuff.
Earlier in the night, MVP set up a match with Elias by teasing he’ll face off against
the winner of the 2023 Royal Rumble.
MVP never said the name of this individual, and then when Elias was in the ring, MVP brought
out his surprise opponent…
…And it was Omos.
The guy he’s been managing for nearly a year [OMOS SIDE SCREEN].
What a bizarre set-up, and the payoff got over like a fart in a church, as Omos quickly
squashed Elias.
But, again, this will play into the main event so it did serve a purpose.
After establishing that they’re the babyfaces now, Alpha Academy lost to The Judgement Day
in a decent little match designed to build the storyline for next week - Dom is tagging
with Priest in the tag title match, and he cannot win a match without his help.
Priest did everything here, including taking out Otis with a South of Heaven from the second
rope, and hit the same move on Gable so Dom could pin him.
I love this team so much, and it will be really curious to see next week’s show to see if
they do take the Raw titles off The Usos.
There’s the obvious point of, ‘why would they make it for only one set of titles if
they weren’t taking the belts off them’, but that is equally shot down by the logic
of, ‘because it made you think they’d take the belts off them’.
Either way, it has worked.
Mia Yim pinned Iyo Sky, and introduced that she’s now friends with Candice LaRae to
set up the next women’s tag title feud.
Yes I also forgot those belts were a thing.
Maybe Sasha was right all along.
Bianca Belair called out Alexa Bliss and set up a title match at the Royal Rumble, and
brawled with her into the crowd.
She was set up to hit the KOD onto a couple of chairs, but was distracted by Uncle Howdy
and Bliss knocked Belair out with a DDT on the floor.
It was set up in this segment that Bliss can pick the stipulation for their title match,
and this would suggest it could be a hardcore match, or maybe even Falls Count Anywhere.
Bronson Reed quickly squashed Akira Tozawa and got more over in one match than Omos has
done in two years.
And the main event was a six pack elimination challenge, where the winner would get a US
title shot against Theory next week on Raw XXX.
The winner of this was fairly obvious as they’d set it up last week when Lashley laid out
Theory, and commentary kept talking about how Theory wouldn’t want to face Bobby Lashley.
Rollins eliminated Miz, Dolph Ziggler and Finn Balor, while Lashley eliminated Baron
Corbin.
And then Lashley won.
But while the winner of this was obvious, there was an interesting story wrinkle.
MVP and Omos came out to watch the match, which Lashley thought was to be against him.
But instead both Omos and MVP eventually helped Lashley get the win, not that he needed their
help.
Omos threw Seth Rollins over the commentary table to set up Lashley’s elimination of
Corbin, and MVP got on the apron to distract Rollins so that Lashley could spear him for
the win.
The focus at the end was on Lashley vs. Theory - as it should be - but there are some question
marks over next week’s title match as to what happens with MVP, Omos, Lashley, and
a potentially reunited Hurt Business.
This was a filler episode of Raw.
The big show is next week, so this was just here to promote that.
But that doesn’t mean Triple H phoned it in.
The main event was good, the Bayley/Becky segment was great, they had good teases with
Kevin Owens and The Bloodline as well as Judgement Day, and they even had time to set up some
stuff for the Rumble in two weeks.
This week’s Raw is a very solid 3 out of 5.
What isn’t a 3 out of 5, though, is watching me eat some nachos - which is exactly what
I did at Cineworld on the latest episode of What’s On - as well as talk about this month’s
big releases like M3gan, The Whale, Tar and more.
Here’s a clip.